Beachy clean 

At the retirement party for Janet Ruiz (see issue 161), Jonathon Lippman, former American Consul in Geneva, approached the Reporter talking trash, literally.

“I live near the beach and almost daily go down to swim in season, to walk or just to sit and take in the scenery. I see garbage on the beach and sometimes floating in the water around me when I’m swimming. I find it disturbing.

“And so three and a half years ago, soon after I moved here, I decided to do something about it. Four or five days a week I clean the beach of Nice from Castel Plage to the Paillon River. You name it, I pick it up – from bottles to beer cans, paper to plastic, metal objects, newspapers and cigarette butts. Just an hour to 75 minutes each time, carrying a plastic garbage bag and dumping the bag at the end, either in the summertime bins on the beach or in winter in the garbage cans on the promenade.”


Jonathan is looking for ten or twelve like-minded people who live near the beach along the Bay of Angels in Nice, and who would be willing to go down to the beach – from Castel Plage across to the airport, depending on how many volunteer – for an hour or so a couple of times a week, at their leisure, and clean up a designated small area.

“I’m willing to head up the project of unofficial volunteers” he tells us, “I suggest we each have an assigned segment – like Castel Plage to Opéra beach, and then the next person could take Opéra to the Paillon River after Beau Rivage and so on. We could meet at my flat in Old Nice once a month for cocktails to talk about it.

“I realise that I am only making a dent but would like to find a group of equally-inclined people who would be willing to help me.”

Interested in Operation Clean Up? Contact 06 41 78 83 61 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.